Text marketing is poised to become the next generation of connecting with your prospects and customers. Think about it. When you leave home, what do you take with you? If you’re like most people, you take your keys, your wallet and your cell phone (way more often than you take your PC).

Here are some startling statistics that will make you wake of and take notice.

1. Market size
Cell phones usage is on track to reach 5 billion over the next few years versus 1.8 billion internet users. This makes the mobile marketin three times larger. If you’re going for volume, it would silly to ignore this statistic. Even if you market to a niche industry, the chances are the buyers are mobile enabled.

95% of mobile phones have texting capabilities. 73% of new mobile phone buyers say text messaging is the most important feature. (Do your teenagers answer or return your calls to their cell phones as quickly as they do your texts?)

3. Usage
Every type of mobile interaction is on the rise. 50% SM interactions happen on cell phones. Online networks now send text messages to alert users of status updates. Mobile apps are almost addictive and keep users ‘plugged in’ to their mobile phones more than ever.

4. Supply vs. demand
350 billion text messages are exchanged monthly. Only 15% of texts include a marketing/commercial message, yet 30% consumers want coupons sent to phones. This represents a huge gap in unmet needs. Consumers are looking for deals they can access at a moments notice as they are out and about shopping and running errands.

If you want your business to grow, it’s critical that you set yourself apart from the competition. Many companies struggle with that idea but it’s not too difficult if you know the steps you must take.

If you fail at distinguishing yourself, you could end up having lots of conversations with prospects that end up going nowhere. You’ll waste money on advertising that won’t get noticed and time on networking that doesn’t lead to presentations and therefore sales.

Let’s face it, unless you have a product or service that is truly unique, other entries in your industry will make the same client claims that you make. And your prospects will either hire the person they like the best or the one who gives them the cheapest price.

So what’s a Biz Dev person to do?

Here are the 5 MUST DOs that will allow you to eradicate the competition and win more sales.

1. Define how you exceed market expectations
Everyone says they deliver exceptional customer service. That won’t distinguish you. Saying you focus on the customer is a big yawner as well. If you’re a printer, on-time delivery is an expectation every client has. If you’re able to design and print faster than anyone else, simplify the review/approval process, customize publications at a cost-effective price or deliver products to worldwide locations in a snap, you might have an edge.

2. Assess your past engagements
Make a list of your biggest success stories. Notice what they had in common. Were they all from particular or related industries? Did you sell or service them in a similar fashion? What made them so successful?

3. Identify your process
Determine what it is that you do with each of your clients. Even if you think there isn’t a process you follow, I challenge you to discover it. It’s there. What’s the first thing you do? Is it an assessment? Do you ask them a series of questions followed by some recommendation(s)? Do you have them do certain things? You may have a number of processes you do under different circumstances.

4. Name It & Claim It
Once you’ve defined the steps you take, claim them and NAME them. Acronyms are great but not necessary. For example, the steps I take clients through who are looking for more balance and joy in their life is RENEW. Release, Elect, Nurture, Eject and Win. While there are a lot of coaches who help people gain a stronger feeling of control over and balance in their lives, how many have a SYSTEM like the RENEW System?

5. Tell your hero’s story
Share with your prospects and clients how you got where you are today. Perhaps it’s the story of how you developed the system or how you grew up and led you to the life you have. Your story is your own. No one else can tell your story. That makes your story a key ingredient in distinguishing yourself and your business from the rest of the world

I heard a marketing consultant/speaker share what it was like growing up the ‘baby’ in a family of 8 children. His slogan was “Being heard above the noise”. He tells his audience what it took for him to get heard above the noise of his children and helps business owners come up with their own stories so they can get heard above the noise.

You have everything you need to set yourself apart. You just need to look at who you are, how you got where you are, what you do that’s unique for your clients and the results you help them produce. This will distinguish you and help you win more sales.

Social media is all the rage these days, yet many business owners struggle to understand why they should bother to jump on the bandwagon. They are mystified about how to monetize their social media efforts.

Here are 3 reasons you can’t afford to miss this online ‘boat’ plus 3 simple things you can do to capitalize on this ‘Brave New World’.

1. Print media is dying and with it, print ads.
Even when it worked, advertising was primarily useful only for building brand awareness. Unless someone sees your ad at the moment they’re thinking of buying something or you have a killer sale going on, it’s likely that it won’t generate a sale for you.
2. Email marketing is dying – fast!
People are inundated with email these days. Many people receive over 100 per day, so the chances that yours will get read are really slim. If you don’t know the right techniques, your messages may never be seen.

3. Networking only works if you follow up quickly and most people don’t.
Actual face time is critical for building relationships and credibility. Unfortunately, most people don’t know how to do that properly. So they smile, chit chat, shake a lot of hands, exchange a bunch of cards and that’s where the story ends.

2. Connect online where your ‘peeps’ are hanging out. Add value, build relationships. Share enough about yourself that people can get to know (and like) you. Make sure you have an account and profile on LinkeIn, Facebook and Twitter. Start a blog and make short, relevant comments on it regularly.

3. Attend networking events with a plan for the kind of people (industries, professions, etc.) that you want to meet. Ask other attendees if they will introduce you to them. Make a commitment to follow up with a few key people you meet at networking events, not to sell them right away, but to get to know them better to see if there really is a match for what you each do.

It’s simple to get started in social media. Make sure you have a strategy of who you’re trying to connect with and how you want to be known in those communities. You’re building a new reputation in a new world. Do it thoughtfully. Once you’re ‘in’, continually refine your efforts. Draw people into your lair by giving then once trust is built, make them offers they can’t refuse.

I’ve been coaching a lot of financial advisors lately on building their book of business by leveraging the power of referrals. Referred prospects make faster decisions and do more business than prospects through any other marketing strategy.

I LOVE referrals…and I get a lot of them.

The problem for most business owners is that they’re afraid to ask for fear of seeming pushy or needy. Colleagues are afraid to provide them because they don’t trust you enough to not jeopardize their relationships in their network.

So what’s a business owner to do?

When we’re in a slow economy, people are naturally hesitant and leery of making major investments. If you’ve found yourself making lots of offers but getting few of them accepted, you’re not alone. The problem may not be that what you have to offer isn’t valuable.

It may be that your approach is off.

Referrals could be the key to your recovery. Referred sales take less work. They close faster. They bring in more money. And if you know the secret to leveraging them, they can pull you right out of this financial doldrum most of the world is trapped in.

Here are the 5 steps, R.E.F.E.R. to getting all the referrals you can muster.

1. Recruit
It’s important to identify the right referral partners. These might be good clients or colleagues who sell non-competing products or services to your target market.

2. Educate
In order to alleviate that “I’m-not-sure-I-want-to-endorse-you” hesitation, you have to properly orient your referral partners. They need to know not only what products and services you offer but how you’re going to treat their colleagues when you meet them. They have to feel confident that you’re not going to embarrass them or irritate the person they’re connecting you with.

3. Facilitate
Many people believe that giving you the name, phone number and email of a prospect is all that it takes. In fact, that’s the weakest kind of referral you can ever get. It’s better than a cold call for sure, but not strong enough to oversome the reluctance people have to meeting unknown sales people.

You want your colleague to talk to the prospect on your behalf and ‘grease the slide’ for you before you ever contact them.

4. Engage
Meeting your new prospect for the first time is a sensitive and delicate ocassion. If you blow it, the relationship could be over for good. And you could be jeopardizing your relationship with the person you already know. You have to make sure your new prospect is comfortable meeting with you and minimize their discomfort and fear that you’re going to take advantage of them.

5. Reward
Once you’ve met with the prospect, whether or not they buy from you, it’s important to properly thank the person who made the introduction. Thanking them can take many forms. The choice of how you show your appreciation should be commensurate with the business opportunity you had. It should also be personal enough that your friend or colleague knows that you gave this gratitude process some thought and didn’t just send them the exact same thing you’d give to everyone.

Sure, you can have a canned referral program but unless your standard gifts are whopper, super-duper items, they won’t have long lasting motivational impact. Gifts don’t have to be expensive, just tailored and thoughtful.

Follow this 5-part system consistently and you’re pipeline will be packed with prospects clamoring to do business with you.

I talk with a lot of marketing strategists who extol the importance of branding for a company’s success but it’s like pulling teeth to drag most of them down from the conceptual clouds and get specific about exactly what they mean.

Every company has a brand whether you’ve proactively designed it or not. Your brand isn’t just the way you present your company; it’s how you’re seen in the eyes of your prospects and clients.

Most of us recognize the highly advertised brands like Coke, Mercedes Benz, Nike etc., but someone the connection between what those big companies with huge advertising budgets do doesn’t clearly tell smaller business owners what they should do and why.

According to Rob Frankl, “branding is not about getting your prospects to choose you over your competition; it’s about getting your prospects to see you as the only solution to their problem.”

Here’s what I discovered when I went on a quest to clear up my own vagueness about this topic.

There are 3 major components of a brand: content, style, and graphics.

Content derives from your values, beliefs and key messaging you deliver to the marketplace. What do you say about your company or products and services? Why are those things important to you? Do your ideal clients actually care? How do you know?

Style reflects the personality of your brand or firm. Are you intelligent, fun, stodgy, casual, conservative or out in left field? Again, is there a style to market match? You need credibility with your marketplace and the way you ‘behave’ in your market will either attract or repel them and determine how much they trust you.

Graphics is all about the visual, physical representation of your company. It includes colors, font, logos and photography. It is the first thing people tend to focus on and create but really should be the outflow of the first two components.

You must know who you are but if you create your brand just based on your internal interests, you could miss the mark by a mile. You must also thoroughly have and understand your target audience before you attempt to ‘present’ yourself to them.

It your brand is appealing, it will make people want you. Real branding raises your bottom line revenues, lowers customer acquisition cost, increases customer retention and profitability. So review the way you’re portraying your company, check with your clients and prospects to understand how they view you and if you’re confident you’re sending the message you intend, market the heck out of it (in all of the right places, of course)!